


Fare Thee Well Good Doctor

by WordMusician



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Echoes of Bad Wolf, Echoes of Bill Potts, Echoes of Clara Oswin Oswald, Echoes of Ninth Doctor, Echoes of Rose, Echoes of Tenth Doctor, F/M, Gen, Regeneration
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-19
Updated: 2018-11-19
Packaged: 2019-08-25 23:57:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 930
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16670845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WordMusician/pseuds/WordMusician
Summary: They say that when you die your life flashes before you.  No one knows this better than the Doctor.





	Fare Thee Well Good Doctor

**Author's Note:**

> My hypothesis as to why the 13th Doctor is female, blonde and brown-eyed.

They say that when you die your life flashes before you.  No one knows this better than the Doctor.

Regeneration energy was consuming him from the inside out.  It was a furnace, a crucible of sorts: a purging fire designed to burn off the dross of a life spent and birth a refined being.  It was a time lord’s version of evolution, or reincarnation, or salvation.  But it hurt like hell and the process was flawed.  The refining never quite did its job.  Important things were forgotten and silly things stubbornly remained.  And the longer one fought the process the greater the kickback when finally released.

At this point, the Doctor knew it was going to be a real bitch.  Still he wrestled for a semblance of control.  He had learned (re-learned?) so much in this body that he wanted salvaged.  He knew again who the Doctor was and why.  He knew that friends were never truly gone – as long as they survived in his memory, their story went with him through the stars.  _“Memories are what define a person,”_ Bill’s avatar had rightly said.  And oh, the memories he had...!

The TARDIS cajoled him.  It was time to let go and become.

Weariness tugged at him, pulling at the walls he’d built to seal away the energy that sought to destroy and re-create every cell in his body.  His existence had become an empty battlefield.  The foe was vanquished for now, but the friends were vanquished forever.  True the memories were there, but he longed for the people themselves.  He was tired of making new friends when he loved too hard and too deeply and had to say goodbye too often. “The more I save the universe, the more it needs saving; it’s a treadmill.”  And he wanted off.

But for the young captain:  Archibald Hamish Lethbridge-Stewart who’d been ripped out of his timeline by his selfish hearts.  In the end they’d returned him just in time for a Christmas miracle and his dear friend the Brigadier’s ancestor survived to carry on.  He’s sutured the wound and mended the fabric of time, just as a good Doctor should.

And for that, he’d been given back his memories of Clara.  _“Run you clever boy and remember, be the Doctor.”_

“Well I suppose one more lifetime won’t kill anyone.” Energy tingled beneath his skin like a fissure in a dam.  “Well, except me.”

The TARDIS called to him again.  She was going to have to suffer the containment and she wasn’t as young as she used to be.  This was going to be a rough regeneration, but it was far better than the alternative.  _Choose life, good Thief!_

A new consciousness was pressing in, eager to take the stage.  “You wait a moment Doctor.  Let’s get this right.  I have a few things to say to you.”  Would that you have learned enough humility to listen....

“Basic stuff first.  Never be cruel.  Never be cowardly.”  Remember the family motto.  Remember where you came from and why you left.  A lonely barn swam into view and three of him stood around a big red button.  At the time, only one of him could see her but now in hindsight he knew her for who she was:  The Moment, Bad Wolf, Rose.  She stretched all across his timeline, coming near when he needed her most, intervening when he was at his worst.  She was more a part of him than his arrogant lordliness had ever accepted...until now.  Testimony had been a great teacher.

“And never, ever eat pears!”  Because some things never changed even if everything is rewritten.  Remember that.  Remember her.  Dare to remember because you cannot forget.

The images were coming faster now, visual and audible, as he marched along the upper gallery.  Vivid memory or pain fueled hallucination; he couldn’t decide which so just embraced them all.  “Remember hate is foolish,” _What about you, Doctor, what the hell are you turning into?_   “...and love...love is always wise.”  _Yeah? And how was that sentence going to end?_

“Always try to be nice...”  _Everybody leaves home in the end..._   “but never fail to be kind.”  _Better with two._

“Oh, and you mustn’t tell anyone your name.  No one would understand it anyway... except...”  _Are you an alien?  Yep.  Okay..._   “Except children.  Children may hear it right... sometimes if their hearts are in the right place and the stars are too.  Children can hear your name.”  _The valiant child will die in battle so soon... if I believe in one thing...just one thing...I believe in her._

“But no one else.  Nobody else, ever.”  Tears streamed down her face and she struggled to say what their hearts were screaming, _I...I love you!_ White hot pain lanced through his hearts.  Was it regeneration of regret?  He didn’t care. Both were true.

“Laugh hard.”  They landed hard and fell down upon the grating, laughing with the joy of just being themselves, of just being together...

“Run fast.” From the very first her hand fit in his as the joining of two puzzle pieces.  _Run!_

“Be kind.” _I want you safe – my Doctor._

The TARDIS console disappeared as her image filled his fading vision and the fire in her eyes matched the fire in his veins.

“Doctor, I let you go.”

Released at last, the regeneration energy ripped through him and he died where he stood.

In the aftermath appeared a woman.  Her hair was blond.  Her eyes were caramel brown.

_How long are you going to stay with me?  Forever._

“Brilliant.”


End file.
